I’d let the frat guys have it for a while longer—hell, maybe I’d sell it to them at a discount, or let them rent it out, or some shit like that.
It didn’t matter.
Me and Philly, we were over.
But me and Cora? Hell, that was another story.26CoraWe drove all day and night.
It was a rush at first. As we left the city, I thought about Alex, about how he would’ve loved to have gotten away from all that, how none of this was fair—how he never should’ve ended up on that sidewalk.
And how I was lucky I didn’t end up there with him.
Lucky that I found Reid, as crazy as that sounded.
We left the city and headed west toward Pittsburgh. Neither of us talked about it, and I don’t think it mattered—we wanted to put distance between us and the city, and that was all.
I watched him drive and as the hours ticked past and the miles churned beneath the tires of his black sedan, I saw something strange happen—at first, I thought it was a trick of the light, or maybe my imagination, but he seemed to relax. His shoulders hunched less, his angry face turned into a smile, and I felt a lightness fall over him that I’d never seen. He tended to carry himself with a scowl, like he was always ready to be pissed off at the world, ready for it to fuck with him, but as we got farther away from the city that all seemed to disappear.
We stopped for gas and food, and through silent agreement chose to keep driving through the night. He drank coffees, paid for in cash that he had hidden all over the safehouse, and listened to the radio. I slept for a little while after we ate fast food for dinner, licking French fry grease from our fingertips and laughing as we tossed the trash into the back seat.
Around three in the morning, he pulled off the turnpike at a small town on the Ohio border and found a late-night diner, its bright neon lights shining like a beacon, trucks parked in the back, big metal slabs covered its front. He took the spot right in front of the door and got out. I followed and we headed inside. It was quiet, a couple of guys in flannel and denim at the counter, a bored-looking waitress staring at her phone. He sat at a booth and asked for coffee and apple pie when the waitress appeared. I asked for a hamburger and a diet Coke.
He tilted his head and reached out a hand. I took his hand, squeezed it, and leaned across the table to kiss him.
“Are you happy?” he asked.
The question took me by surprise. “I don’t know.”
“I’m happy.” He laughed softly, grinning like a little boy. “Do you know the last time I said those words? Hell, the last time it even occurred to me that happiness was something I’d ever have?”
“I can’t imagine.” I shook my head and smiled back. “Yeah, I’m happy too.”
“I wanted to ask you something, but you might think it’s stupid.”
“Go ahead and ask. At this point, I don’t think you could surprise me.”
He released my hands and stood up. I looked at him, not sure what he was doing, and my heart began to beat faster as he dropped to one knee. “Cora, I want you to marry me.”
I laughed a little. “We’re already married,” I said, reaching to touch the ring on my finger—but realized it was gone.
He reached into his pocket and held it up. “For real this time. We’ll do a ceremony, or however you want to do it, but this’ll be on our terms. None of that fake, arranged marriage mafia bullshit. Just me and you.”
I sucked in a breath and nodded. “Of course.”
He slid the ring on my finger. “I love you. I don’t think I’ve said it yet, but I love you.”
“I love you too.”
He kissed me, and I heard the truckers and the waitress clapping. I laughed, smiled, waved at them, and he grinned. She brought over our drinks, his apple pie, and a slice of cheesecake, “On the house, hon.”
He sat back down and took a big sip of his coffee. I watched him, at his rough body, at his rumpled clothes, at his handsome lips and hair, and I wondered how this happened—how we found each other.
“I hated you, you know,” I said, voice soft. “When we first met.”
“I hated you too. Well, I was happy you weren’t ugly.”
“But it wasn’t really you, it was all of you. All you mafia guys.” I chewed my lip and realized something. It hit me, nearly overwhelming, and I knew without a doubt that we’d made the right choice—because if we hadn’t, we never could have been happy. Even if we made all the right choices, the families, the crews, they would’ve torn us apart. I would’ve hated him, resented him, and sooner or later, he would’ve felt it and returned the feeling.